Easter Sunday, April 8, 2012

John's telling of the encounter of Mary Magdalene with the risen Christ is striking for its narrative perspective. This might seem to be among its less remarkable features to most readers, but a writer reads a story differently than other people do, noticing technique and workmanship the way any artisan will consider a product of her craft—the mystery of it, as they said in the Middle Ages. And the way in which a story is told, its angle of vision, has everything to do with what it means, and is therefore a matter of great interest to anyone who is attentive to the art of narrative.